A mother’s love

We could learn a lot from Ozala the Gorilla at Twycross Zoo in Warwickshire. Her latest baby was born on 2nd January as a result of a successful primate breeding programme but so far keepers have been unable to determine the sex of the newborn since the 16-stone Mum won’t let anyone near her precious infant.

This is the 4th baby for 18-year old Ozala, and it may well be that she is over-protective since her 1st offspring, Matadi, born in 2003, was taken away from her and is now being cared for at Paignton Zoo in Devon. Her 2nd, a female called Ndoki sadly died aged 3 months in 2007 and her 3rd, a male called Okanda was born in April last year. Okanda survived after some initial health problems and is now being cared for in Stuttgart Zoo in Germany.

I do hope she is allowed to keep this new addition. It seems extremely cruel to me that she should be parted from her babies when she so clearly has extremely strong maternal instincts. I accept that Gorillas are a critically endangered species, but come on! How could you separate these two?